ld fall in
and bury us; the other lest we should rush too fast, and so be carried
headlong into the black whirlpool at the bottom, the middle of which was
still unfrozen, and looking more horrible by the contrast. Against this
danger I made provision, by fixing a stout bar across; but of the other
we must take our chance, and trust ourselves to Providence.

I hastened home at my utmost speed, and told my mother for God's sake
to keep the house up till my return, and to have plenty of fire blazing,
and plenty of water boiling, and food enough hot for a dozen people, and
the best bed aired with the warming-pan. Dear mother smiled softly at my
excitement, though her own was not much less, I am sure, and enhanced by
sore anxiety. Then I gave very strict directions to Annie, and praised
her a little, and kissed her; and I even endeavoured to flatter Eliza,
lest she should be disagreeable.

After this I took some brandy, both within and about me; the former,
because I had sharp work to do; and the latter in fear of whatever might
happen, in such great cold, to my comrades. Also I carried some other
provisions, grieving much at their coldness: and then I went to the
upper linhay, and took our new light pony-sledd, which had been made
almost as much for pleasure as for business; though God only knows how
our girls could have found any pleasure in bumping along so. On the
snow, however, it ran as sweetly as if it had been made for it; yet I
durst not take the pony with it; in the first place, because his hoofs
would break through the ever-shifting surface of the light and piling
snow; and secondly, because these ponies, coming from the forest, have a
dreadful trick of neighing, and most of all in frosty weather.

Therefore I girded my own body with a dozen turns of hay-rope, twisting
both the ends in under at the bottom of my breast, and winding the hay
on the skew a little, that the hempen thong might not slip between, and
so cut me in the drawing. I put a good piece of spare rope in the sledd,
and the cross-seat with the back to it, which was stuffed with our
own wool, as well as two or three fur coats; and then, just as I was
starting, out came Annie, in spite of the cold, panting for fear of
missing me, and with nothing on her head, but a lanthorn in one hand.

"Oh, John, here is the most wonderful thing! Mother has never shown it
before; and I can't think how she could make up her mind. She had
gotten it in a great well